It is to the vision and to the genius of the first editor of _The Ladies' Home Journal_ that the unprecedented success of the magazine is primarily due.

It was the purpose and the policy of making a magazine of authoritative service for the womanhood of America, a service which would visualize for womanhood its highest domestic estate, that had won success for the periodical from its inception.

It is difficult to believe, in the multiplicity of similar magazines today, that such a purpose was new; that _The Ladies' Home Journal_ was a path-finder; but the convincing proof is found in the fact that all the later magazines of this class have followed in the wake of the periodical conceived by Mrs.Curtis, and have ever since been its imitators.
When Edward Bok succeeded Mrs.Curtis, he immediately encountered another popular misconception of a woman's magazine--the conviction that if a man is the editor of a periodical with a distinctly feminine appeal, he must, as the term goes, "understand women." If Bok had believed this to be true, he would never have assumed the position.
How deeply rooted is this belief was brought home to him on every hand when his decision to accept the Philadelphia position was announced.
His mother, knowing her son better than did any one else, looked at him with amazement.

She could not believe that he was serious in his decision to cater to women's needs when he knew so little about them.
His friends, too, were intensely amused, and took no pains to hide their amusement from him.

They knew him to be the very opposite of "a lady's man," and when they were not convulsed with hilarity they were incredulous and marvelled.
No man, perhaps, could have been chosen for the position who had a less intimate knowledge of women.